KCIC Wants Longer High-Speed Rail Concession Time
PT Kereta Api Indonesia China (KCIC) has submitted a concession extension proposal for the Jakarta-Bandung high-speed rail from 50 to 80 years. KCIC president director Dwiyana Slamet Riyadi argued that a longer concession period would be crucial because situations have changed and affected the return on investment. "The most critical thing is the demand forecast. What we do is to evaluate what has existed before," Dwiyana said on Thursday.
Dwiyana revealed that the demand forecast conducted by the Institut Teknologi Bandung's Research and Industry Affiliation Agency (LAPI) before the COVID-19 pandemic revealed that the train might transport 60,000 passengers per day. However, a recent study by the Polar of Universitas Indonesia predicted that it could only transport 29,000 passengers daily. Besides, the development of the Transit Oriented Development (TOD) area, which should be able to contribute to the revenue to KCIC, also suffered from a delay. Moreover, the project is suffering from a cost overrun of around US$6.07 billion-US$7.5 billion. "This will affect the investment of high-speed rail," he said.